


Chaos Theory

by gottabekiddinme



Category: Iron Man (Movies)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 12:31:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6985183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gottabekiddinme/pseuds/gottabekiddinme
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony made an interesting friend at MIT.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chaos Theory

**Author's Note:**

> Steve Rogers: (Storming in with a copy of Captain America:Steve Rogers #1 which he proceeds to shred). Have you seen this? HAVE YOU SEEN THIS?
> 
> Me: Yes, Steve, I'm aware of it. I've been posting about it on Tumblr. And I won't be buying it.
> 
> Steve: *Incoherent, strangled sounds of rage*
> 
> Me: I know.
> 
> Steve: You're not gonna need me for a while, are you?
> 
> Me: No, not yet.
> 
> Steve: Then I'm gonna go punch Hitler again. It's cathartic.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> So. This has nothing to do with Cap. It's just a plot bunny that decided to hold me hostage. For purposes of this fic, the Olympians are something like the Aesir. Eris may be out of character, but this is who she wanted to be this time.
> 
> BTW I own nothing, but could probably write a better Captain America.

Eris has always liked learning. She watches humanity in fascination, invites herself to Loki's lessons, and actively seeks out new teachers whenever she can.

She finds herself on Earth more often than not. It annoys her that she has to disguise herself as a man in order for her would-be teachers to take her seriously, but to sit at the feet of Plato? She would do it again.

When the first University is established at Bologne, she is one of the first students. She finds that she likes earning degrees, and soon – or what feels like soon, to a being as long lived as her – she has a wall of diplomas. Oxford, Cambridge, Stanford, Yale, Universities in Cairo, Tokyo, St. Petersburg -she holds degrees in literature, medicine, any field that strikes her fancy. She is thrilled when universities start awarding degrees to women and she can discard her male disguise for good.

In the late twentieth century, she decides to add an engineering degree and finagles herself an acceptance to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology under the name Eris Vardalos.

Chaos goddess – well, humans say goddess – or not, Eris has always made friends with humans quite easily. She wouldn't call James Rhodes her best friend – that dubious honour will always go to Loki – but they enjoy each other's company and seek each other out often.

Eris and James are in the library discussing a professor she's already had and he's just signed up for when she raises a hand and tilts her head.

“You hear that?”

“What?”

Someone is crying. Not “finals are coming and I haven't slept in a week” crying, this is “I am alone and young and scared” crying. Eris rises from her seat and follows the sound to a small desk tucked in a corner. The seat is empty, so she takes it, spins it around, straddles it, and says, “Hey.”

A face far too young to be a college student looks up at her. He doesn't say a word, but after a moment Eris snaps her fingers in recognition. “Tony, right? You're in one of my classes.”

James comes up behind her, having stolen a chair from another desk for himself. “Tony Stark? Heard you were coming here.” Neither of them asks him what's wrong, and it takes a while to get him out from under the desk, but she and James silently agree that Tony is theirs now.

They never find out what drove Tony under the desk that day, but the rest of MIT soon learns that James Rhodes is a brick wall and Eris Vardalos is a tiny ball of rage, and while he is calm and deliberate, she is both reckless and vicious.

The rest of their time at MIT passes in a whirlwind of work, pranks, parties and, unfortunately, booze. James, now Rhodey, takes it upon himself to make sure Tony always gets home safely, while Eris tasks herself with protecting him from the people around him.

She'll never forgive herself for missing Sunset Bain and Tiberius Stone.

They learn that Tony, when threatened, will go to ground, usually in the workshop he's designated as “his”. DUM-E, his first AI, is the result of several straight days in hiding an a lot of continuous tinkering. Also copious amounts of alcohol. Like, truly, staggeringly impressive amounts of alcohol. They almost had to take him to get his stomach pumped. Again.

Eris is honoured to be the first to meet DUM-E, and when Tony begins to work on JARVIS, she starts creating her own AI right alongside him – with occasional breaks to monitor the boy's alcohol intake. While Tony finds increasingly ridiculous ways to make JARVIS an acronym (Just a Really Very Intelligent System, Tony? Really?), she unapologetically names hers Nyx, after her mother.

And that's another thing.

Tony – and James, since to tell Tony anything is to tell Rhodey – becomes the first mortal, ever, to know the truth of her identity. It takes some proving, of course, Tony is a born scientist after all, but it's a relief to be able to be herself with them. She takes to setting loose small windstorms and tiny tornadoes, both to relieve stress and to tidy her workspace – and sometimes to distract Tony.

Eris and James are with Tony when he finds out about his parents, and stand beside him when, dry-eyed, he buries them. They meet Obadiah Stane that day, and while she'll tolerate him for Tony's sake, she recognizes him a little too well. There is too much anger and Chaos in this man, too much of the worst of herself, and she will never like him.

After their last, epic hack (they make several buildings on the Harvard campus shake, and no, there are no Chaos powers involved) he offers her a job and she almost says yes. Almost. But the weapons that Stark Industries makes are devastating enough; the addition of her powers would make them even more frightening. He nods, smiles, and makes her promise that she won't work for Justin Hammer instead.

Eris takes a job with Disney in Anaheim, reining in her powers just enough to enhance her work without twisting it. To be quite honest, she takes more than a little unholy glee in informing Tony that she's part of the team revamping the old Captain America ride. The bidding war between Howard Stark and Walt Disney for the rights to Captain America's likeness is legendary.

She usually gets her degree, fakes a death for her mortal alter ego and goes home, but this time she doesn't want to leave. 

She and James keep in close contact, via text and email and one of them calling the other maybe once a week. Tony, though, contacts her nearly every day. He'll call while she's at work, while he's in his workshop, when he should be in meetings, in the middle of the night, drunk or sober. She first meets Pepper over the phone and frankly approves of her influence, no matter how uneasy it makes her at first to allow another woman so close to her Tony. And he is hers, as much as Loki is. Loki has been her best friend for millenia, but Tony is, well, Tony.

He's hers to protect, from others and himself. Hers to avenge, on Sunset Bain and Tiberius Stone – who quite frankly is lucky to be alive, and Hades and Persephone assure her that creative punishments are waiting for them both. Tony is also hers to drag out of the workshop and reassure that yes, there are people who really do like him.

They settle into semi adult life and happily coast along for several years, Eris always careful not to mix her life on Olympus and her life in California.

And then Afghanistan happens.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure whether this is a first chapter or the first fic in a series, so this will be marked as finished until I know.  
> The bit about a Cap ride is stolen from a post on Copperbadge's Tumblr.


End file.
